He’s Oor Wul­lie, your Wul­lie..and a’ artists Wul­lie

Could you trans­form Scot­land’s favourite son?

has worn the same dun­ga­rees since 1936 so maybe it is time for Oor Wul­l­lie to try a new look.

And artists from across the globe are be­ing in­vited to trans­form Scot­land’s favourite son and see their de­sign fea­ture in a spec­tac­u­lar na­tional fundraiser.

Oor Wul­lie’s Big Bucket Trail will see more than 150 sculp­tures of Wul­lie – all one-offs – on the streets of our towns and cities and around Scot­land’s land­marks in a huge pub­lic art trail next year.

The scores of spe­cially de­signed Wul­lies will go on dis­play for fam­i­lies to en­joy in Aberdeen, Dundee, Ed­in­burgh, Glas­gow and In­ver­ness from June to Septem­ber. Af­ter the 11-week pub­lic ex­hi­bi­tion, they’ll be auc­tioned off to raise mil­lions of pounds for Scot­land’s chil­dren’s hos­pi­tal char­i­ties.

Some have al­ready been de­signed – but to­day we launch the search for artists, from gifted am­a­teurs to ex­pe­ri­enced pro­fes­sion­als, to sub­mit their ideas for a brand new look for the spiky-haired Sun­day Post icon. De­signs for the blank sculp­tures – which fea­ture a laugh­ing Oor Wul­lie sit­ting on his fa­mous bucket – are wel­come in any art form, from tra­di­tional to new me­dia, fine art to il­lus­tra­tions, graf­fiti and mo­saic.

Backed by First Min­ster Ni­cola Stur­geon, Oor Wul­lie’s Big Bucket Trail, run by Wild in Art, will unite artists, busi­nesses, com­mu­ni­ties and schools as it raises aware­ness of the work of the char­i­ties help­ing sick chil­dren in Scot­land.

Funds raised from the project will be do­nated to Glas­gow Chil­dren’s Hos­pi­tal Char­ity (GCHC), Ed­in­burgh Chil­dren’s Hos­pi­tal Char­ity and The ARCHIE Foun­da­tion – which to­gether look af­ter nearly half a mil­lion of the bravest young­sters in the coun­try ev­ery year.

Shona Car­dle, GCHC chief ex­ec­u­tive, said: “With Scot­land’s favourite son as their can­vas, we ea­gerly an­tic­i­pate the sub­mis­sions from artists hope­ful of see­ing their de­sign come alive on a life­size Oor Wul­lie sculp­ture. The art pro­gramme will in­spire pa­tients and cre­ate a truly unique trail.”

The sum­mer-long event, which is free to view, fol­lows the hugely suc­cess­ful Bucket Trail in Dundee two years ago, which raised £900,000 for The ARCHIE Foun­da­tion’s bid to place a spe­cial­ist unit at Tay­side Chil­dren’s Hos­pi­tal at Ninewells.

The Archie Foun­da­tion’s spe­cial Oor Wul­lie sculp­ture, in the stu­dio and be­side the Forth